Midland: ‘Every Single Night, We Play as If We’re Playing in a Honky-Tonk’

Thanks to their growing popularity, more and more fans are heading to see country trio Midland play live. However, the group says that no matter how big the crowds get, they'll always be an intimate shows to them.

"Every single night, we're playing as if we're playing in a honky-tonk," the group explained to The Boot and other media outlets backstage at the 2018 CMA Music Festival. "We're giving our blood and guts -- everything we've got -- onstage, no matter whether we're playing for eight people or 80,000 people. We bring it every single night; that's just what we do."

Mark Wystrach, Cameron Duddy and Jess Carson admit they're still adjusting to the bigger stages, which offer more room to move around ... but also more room for error. "You have to mark your breath," they explain, "because when you're running back and forth down a runway, you can come back just completely out of breath."

While the stages may be getting bigger, the hallmarks of a Midland show -- high energy, colorful Western getup and a whole lot of personality -- have remained the same since the outset of their career as a band. The trio says their personas are not characters they inhabit, but are instead a glimpse into what life was really like for them before fame: "When you're watching "Burn Out,"" they note, "that's not us jumping into character so much as it's us describing what it's like during a Saturday night two or three years ago, before millions of people knew our names."

The band's members agree they're honored to be carrying the torch for their brand of country. "We were blessed enough that there were people in Nashville who wanted to take a chance on [us]," they add. "We've had some success, and we're just gonna keep doing what we do."